Chapter 9

When I arrived at work the following morning, Alder Vervain was already there. Part of me was pleased to see him, and that in itself annoyed me.

“You’re tenacious,” I said. I held the door open for him with my foot after I stepped inside.

Alder walked through the door, tucking a newspaper under his arm. “You don’t happen to make donuts in this place, do you?”

“No, just cakes and cupcakes.” As usual, he was dressed all in black. The scent of cinnamon, and something I couldn’t quite identify, seemed to follow him.

“I don’t think I should eat a cupcake for breakfast,” he said.

I shrugged. “Donuts aren’t really much better.” I walked behind the counter. Of course, he was just a private eye, so he had no jurisdiction anywhere, but there was no harm in answering questions. “Okay, enough of the small talk. What do you want to ask me?”

“Many things.” Alder bent to look in the empty display counter. “Do you make the cakes fresh each day?”

I folded my arms. “Is that what you really wanted to ask me?”

Alder shot me a look of appraisal, or so I assumed. “What happened with Brant McCallum?”

I shifted from one foot to another. “As you well know, his wife was arrested for his murder. She confessed. I had nothing to do with that.”

Alder walked over to the counter. “I heard that you and your friends were investigating. You fancied yourself as detectives.”

“Where did you hear that?”

“I have my sources,” he said.

“Look, my friends and I did investigate, but that was only because the death in my shop was affecting the business. I certainly wouldn’t say that we fancied ourselves as detectives or anything like that.”

“I see.” Alder leaned on the counter.

Silence hung in the air between us, making me more and more tense. I was the one to break the silence. “I don’t understand why you’re asking me questions when you know I had nothing to do with it.”

Alder straightened up. “I’m just trying to get a feel for this whole situation. A man is dead—his body shows up on your doorstep. Previously a man dropped dead in your bakery. You have to admit that it sounds rather weird.”

“I suppose it does.”

“And we both know you don’t do the baking here. When exactly does your employee come in?”

Again, I tried not to show surprise on my face. Again, I failed.

“Sources,” Alder said simply. He still seemed to be amused. “My client thinks you have something to do with all the things going on here lately. You show up in town; a man dies in your shop; you get your friends together and you all play Scooby Doo or something like that, but it works out okay. Now another man has died, this time at your house, and you’re going to get the crew back together and solve another mystery. Is that it? My client wonders if there’s more to it than that. I shouldn’t tell you all that, but to be honest, I like you.” He grimaced when he said that, as if liking me was distasteful to him.

I frowned.

“You seem like a nice, normal person,” he continued, “and so do your friends. Well, nice if not normal, in their case.” He chuckled to himself. “It really does seem as if you’re getting caught up in a bad case of wrong time, wrong place. Yet in my experience, that’s not real. If someone’s in the wrong place, it’s because they put themselves there.”

“I assure you, it’s nothing but wrong time, wrong place with me. I didn’t want a man to die in my cake shop or outside my house. Anyway, who is your client?”

“I can’t tell you that.”

“So someone can pay you to follow me around, to figure out everything about me, to snoop into my private life, and you won’t even tell me who it is?”

Alder nodded. “Yes.”

I rolled my eyes. “That’s not fair.”

“Life isn’t fair,” Alder said smugly.

“Spare me the philosophical musings,” I said. “It annoys people. Remember that Socrates was put to death for annoying people.”

Alder sighed.

I went on. “Well, do you believe I had nothing to do with Thomas Hale’s death?”

Alder tapped his finger on the counter for a while before looking up at me. “I can tell a lot about someone just by watching them. I can tell when they’re lying or nervous, for example.”

“Oh yes?” I said, interested in spite of myself. “I used to watch that show on TV. I can’t remember what it’s called. Anyway, there was a man who helped the police, and he could tell if someone was lying. He looked for facial ticks, sweating, stuff like that. Apparently when people lie, they look to the left, but look to the right if they’re trying to remember something. Or is it the other way around?”

“It depends whether they’re right or left handed,” Alder said, “but that theory’s been discounted by scientists.”

“But you can tell if someone’s lying?”

Alder smiled at me, and when he spoke, his voice for once dripped with charm. “It’s a sixth sense I have.”

I stared at him to see if he was joking, but his expression did not change. If only I could have such a sixth sense. “Oh,” was I could say.

“I know you had nothing to do with the realtor’s death,” he continued, “and that’s what I’m going to tell my client. I’m not so sure they’ll agree, so I’m also not so sure you won’t be seeing more of me.”

I nodded. I was secretly pleased to be seeing more of him, because I felt a magnetic attraction to him, albeit regretfully. He was the cliché tall, dark and handsome, to be sure, but there was something more. He had an almost otherworldly presence. I looked up to see him watching me, and I fervently hoped that mindreading wasn’t another of his arcane talents.

“But, like I said, I think it’s a waste of time. To tell you the truth, I’ve made a lot of money wasting my time on things that never pan out, and if this is another case of that, then so be it.”

I nodded, because I had no idea how to respond to that. It sounded as if Alder was letting me know he wasn’t going to be a problem for me, but that he would be around, watching. I figured I could live with that.

Alder opened his mouth to speak, but he was forestalled by Thyme’s entrance. “Thyme,” he said stiffly.

She nodded to him. “Alder.” Her voice was filled with tension.

Alder left the shop in a hurry, leaving Thyme wringing her hands.

“Are you feeling any better today?” I asked her, wondering if now was the right time to question her over the mysterious Alder Vervain.

“Back to normal, pretty much,” she said, but she didn’t look normal. She looked shaken. “What did he want?”

I answered her question with a question. “Did you know that he’s a private detective?”

Thyme nodded, and walked into the kitchen. “Of course. Small town—everyone knows everyone else’s business. Is he investigating you? Or what? He wasn’t buying cupcakes.”

“Yes, he is investigating me!” I exclaimed. “Someone’s paid him to, because they think I had something to do with the murder of Thomas Hale.”

Thyme turned after setting some mixing bowls on the counter. “He didn’t tell you who his employer was by any chance, did he?”

I pulled a face. “No. He asked me some questions.”

Thyme put down the flour and looked at me. “Does he think you had something to do with it?” She seemed concerned, but I had no idea why.

“He said he believes me.”

Thyme seemed to be thinking that over.

I pressed on. “He said he knows when someone is lying to him. He has a sixth sense about it.”

Thyme snorted rudely.

“He knew that I couldn’t bake.”

“The whole town knows you can’t bake!” Thyme exclaimed.

I chuckled. “Too true. I suppose it does look fishy that a man died in my store and then at my house, but I don’t know why anyone would be so convinced that I had something to do with it. Anyway, why do you have a problem with Alder Vervain?”

Thyme shot me a look. “Who says I have a problem with…”

I cut her off, holding up my hand. “Come on. I overheard you guys talking about him once, and you acted weird around him.”

Thyme chewed her lip. “Well, I suppose you’ll have to know sooner or later.”

I was growing impatient. “Know what?”

Thyme rubbed her temples and sighed loudly. “Do you know anything about witchcraft laws in Australia?”

“No, how would I? I didn’t know anything about witches until I moved to Bayberry Creek.”

Thyme waved one hand at me. “Oh, yes, sorry. Well, no one was ever put to death in Australia, or anything like that. No one has ever been successfully prosecuted for witchcraft in Australia, but a woman was charged with fortune telling in South Australia about sixty years ago. And a law against practicing witchcraft was repealed in the state of Victoria only as recently as 2005, as ridiculous as that sounds. Alder Vervain’s family…” She hesitated.

I was frustrated. How bad could it be? “Just spit it out, Thyme.”

She nodded. “His family is from a long line of witch hunters.”

“What?” I shrieked. “Witch hunters, like in the movies?” Images of Alder with a crossbow and vials of holy water flashed through my mind. He certainly looked the part.

“No. That was too strong a term, I suppose. Alder’s family has always opposed the repeal of witchcraft laws in Australia.”

I scratched my head. “I still can’t see the problem. What am I missing?”

“Alder’s family are firmly on a witch hunt, metaphorically and figuratively speaking,” Thyme said angrily. “Obviously, they can’t have anyone charged with witchcraft in this day and age, so they look for anything they can. They used to complain to the local council authorities about Ruprecht’s shop.” She stopped and took a deep breath. “I’ve been speaking in the present tense, but Alder’s parents died some time back. They did all sorts of horrible things to Camino, Ruprecht, and my parents, too, years ago. It’s left to Alder now.”

“What’s left to him? What are you saying? What horrible things did they do?”

Thyme folded her arms across her chest. “You name it; they did it. They spread rumors, constantly complained to authorities. They even rang the cops with anonymous tips that Ruprecht and Camino were drug dealers. The tax office audited Ruprecht, Camino, and my parents time and time again. Alder’s parents really persecuted them.”

“But surely none of this happened recently?” I asked her.

Thyme shook her head. “No, but Alder’s only just come back to town. He’s been watching you, so it seems that he’s going to start up again on all of us, taking up where his parents left off. And this time, you’re in his sights, too.”